Late last month, entertainment journalists reported a story emanating from so deep inside the belly of the film-industry beast that, at first, it seemed the story could not possibly have relevance to anyone except media professionals. The respected New York Film Critics Circle revealed the date on which the group will distribute its awards for movies released in 2011. Instead of December, when the announcement normally happens, this year the awards will get handed out on Nov. 28, which makes the New York Film Critics Circle the new first stop on the road leading to the Academy Awards at the end of February.
That’s right, after years in which even Hollywood professionals have complained that “awards season” is too long, the season just got longer. But there’s another dimension to this announcement, one with actual relevance to those living outside the showbiz bubble. Because year-end awards will start appearing while Americans are still polishing off their Thanksgiving leftovers, most of the major films vying for awards will get released after they’ve started winning (or losing) prizes. In other words, the public’s role in helping to pick which movies gain year-end momentum just shrank.
Back when movie awards were new, prizes got handed out well after the year was over, giving films a chance to rise or fall in the court of public opinion before their denial or receipt of a golden statuette determined their historical status. The first Academy Awards, conceived as a biannual event celebrating pictures released in 1927 and 1928, was held on May 16, 1939. May! Imagine that, letting over five months pass before trying to figure out what accomplishments in the previous year should be celebrated.
But now, with the onslaught of critics awards and Directors Guild Awards and Golden Globes and Screen Actors Guild awards and so on, prizes are issued weeks before most Oscar-bait movies have been released in Los Angeles or New York, and months before those movies hit secondary markets.
Consider some of the effects of all this premature adulation:
1. Whereas in previous years, movie fans could dive into the Oscar-bait season eager to discover exciting performances within the dozens of grown-up movies that are released at the end of every year, the awards-season frenzy now anoints a chosen few titles so quickly that by the time an Oscar-bait movie opens in, say, mid-December, if the movie doesn’t already have awards to its name, it feels like damaged goods. Interesting studio movies that could have found their audiences are effectively killed in the cradle, because in a crowded holiday season, moviegoers have to make choices about which pictures to see in theaters and which to catch on video. Patrons being careful with their ticket-buying money will almost always gravitate to the films that have been designated as surefire award winners.
2. Every awards season, a handful of performers get singled out for such overwhelming praise (sometimes deservedly so and sometimes not) that it’s impossible to watch the movies containing those performances with fresh eyes. Last year, for instance, audiences were aware of early awards for performances like Melissa Leo’s supporting role in The Fighter and Natalie Portman’s leading role in Black Swan well before the movies entered wide release. Instead of discovering these performances and building excitement organically, audiences went into those movies with a jaded attitude: “Okay, let’s see if this lives up to the hype.” Entering a theater with a chip on one’s shoulder is fine for a special-effects spectacular, which is designed to blow audiences away, but why should small character pieces hit the marketplace carrying this sort of baggage?
3. Specialty distributors need word of mouth to justify expanding the theatrical releases of their movies from major markets to secondary markets. So, if some interesting low-budget picture loses momentum early in the awards season, the distributor adjusts the release pattern. Thus, the type of movie that a generation ago might have traveled across the country over the course of several months, seeking new fans as its reputation spread, now makes only a fleeting appearance in a handful of major cities before hitting DVD. In a very real way, the awards-season frenzy contributes to the lack of diversity at theaters, and because box-office returns influence studio’s decisions about which movies to make, this homogenization infects the development pipeline, forming the proverbial vicious circle.
I keep hoping that some year, maybe soon, audiences will finally reach the end of their tolerance for awards-season nonsense, and right now seems like a good time for that possibility to manifest. At the end of a bruising economic year in which record numbers of Americans are out of work, and in which everybody the world over is struggling to stay solvent, the spectacle of overpaid actors in gowns and tuxedos congratulating each other for being wonderful will seem even more vulgar than usual. Accordingly, the fact that the spectacle will now extend for a longer period of time than before might wear down the public’s patience.
For so many reasons, a course correction to the silly trend of premature movie awards might benefit the film industry, at least from a creative standpoint, even though most Hollywood professionals subscribe to the long-held fallacy that giving out awards generates only positive publicity. From where I sit, there’s nothing positive about marginalizing the role of public opinion. Instead of having pundits tell me what all the great movies and great performances are, I’d rather discover those things for myself.